294 



NATURE 



\_yan. 24, i< 



or mixed Negro descent, and mostly pagans or nominal 

 Muhammadans. The rest belong to various branches of 

 the Semitic and Hamitic stocks, and are nearly all 

 Muhammadans of a more or less fanatical type. In his 

 valuable "Report on the Sudan for 1S83" Lieut.-Col. 

 Stewart remarks: "Besides the main division of the 

 people into Arab and Negro, they are again subdivided 

 into a number of tribes and sub-tribes, some sedentary 

 and others nomad. Of the Negro tribes all are sedentary 

 and cultivators, but the Arabs are for the most part 

 nomads or wanderers, each tribe within certain well- 

 known limits. All these Arab tribes are large owners of 

 cattle, camels, horses, and slaves. These last, along with 

 the Arab women, generally cultivate some fields of doora 

 (a kind of millet) or corn, sufficient for the wants of the 

 tribe. The Arab himself would consider it a disgrace to 

 practise any manual labour. He is essentially a hunter, 

 a robber, and a warrior, and, after caring for his cattle, 

 devotes all his energies to slave-hunting and war '' (p. 8). 



This presents a fairly accurate picture of the natural 

 relations of the people in all respects except as regards 

 the main division into two ethnical groups — Arab and 

 Negro. Frotn what has been already stated it is obvious 

 that this is a totally inadequate distribution. It is another 

 and signal instance of that official ignorance or disregard 

 of the racial conditions that has ever been such a fruitful 

 source of political troubles and disasters in lands governed 

 or controlled by foreign administrators. As a matter of 

 fact, Egyptian Sudan is a region of great ethnical com- 

 plexity, and so far from being occupied by Arabs and 

 Negroes alone, there are scarcely any Arabs or Negroes 

 at all anywhere east of the Nile between Khartum and 

 Egypt. To designate as Arabs the tribes at present blocking 

 the Suakin- Berber route, as is currently done, betrays a 

 depth of ethnological ignorance analogous to that of the 

 writer who should group Basques, for instance, and Slavs 

 in the same category. The Arabs thenihelves are com- 

 paratively recent intruders, although it is possible that 

 some, such as the Beni-Omr, now fused with the Funj 

 and Hamagh Negroid peoples of Senaar, may have found 

 their way across the Red Sea into the Nile basin in 

 pre-Muhammadan times. But the Bishari tribes about 

 Suakin are the true autochthonous element, lineal 

 descendants of the Blemmyes and other historic peoples 

 whose names are enrolled in Greek, Roman, and Axumite 

 records. But these and other points will be made clear 

 by the above synoptical table, with accompanying map, of 

 the East Sudanese races and tribes. 



Khartum, the centre of administration for all these dis- 

 cordant elements, has been brought within the sphere of 

 civilisation since 1819, when it was occupied by the 

 Egyptian troops under Ismael Pasha. At that time it 

 was a mere outpost of the Hamagh kingdom, Senaar ; 

 but, thanks to its convenient position at the confluence 

 of the two Niles midway between the Mediterranean and 

 the equator, it soon rose to importance under the strong 

 government of Mehemet Ali. Under Khurshid Pasha 

 (1826-37) its skin and reed hovels were replaced by sub- 

 stantial brick houses, and at present it is by far the largest 

 and most flourishing place in Central Africa, with a mot- 

 ey population of over 40,000, including the garrison 

 roops. Here considerable quantities of goods in transit 

 are always in deposit ; here are resident many Euro- 

 peans interested in the African trade, and in the more 

 philanthropic work of African culture and exploration. 

 Khartum has thus become inseparably associated with all 

 the work done during the last half century towards de- 

 veloping the material resources of the land and raising 

 the moral status of its inhabitants. At its mention, the 

 names of Petherick, Beltrami, Schweinfurth, Baker, Gor- 

 don, Marno, Junker, Linant de Bellefonds, Emin Bey, 

 Gessi, and many other heroic pioneers in the cause of 

 African progress, are irresistibly conjured up. Such names 

 plead silently but eloquently for its preservation to civili- 



sation in the better sense of the 'word, and make us feel 

 how great a crime against humanity would be its aban- 

 donment to barbarism and the villainous Arab slave- 

 dealers of Central Africa. A. H. Keane 



NOTES 

 We understand that subscriptions to a memorial to the late 

 Mr. F. Hatton are being asked for in a paper in which 

 the name of Prof. Huxley is mentioned as one of the committee 

 and an intending subscriber. We are authorised to state that 

 the name of Prof. Huxley has been employed without his 

 knowledge. 



We have received the following subscriptions on behalf of the 

 Hermann Miiller Fund :— Prof . W. H. Flower, F.R.S., \l. ; 

 Mr. W. E. Hart, \l. ; K., 10^. 



Mr. Frank E. Beddard, M.A., of the University of Oxford, 

 Naturalist to the Challeitgcr Commission, has been selected out 

 of thirteen candidates for the post of Prosector to the Zoological 

 Society of London, in succession to the late Mr. W. A. Forbes. 

 Mr. Beddard was a pupil of the late Prof. RoUeston, and for the 

 past year has been employed on editorial and other work con- 

 nected with the issue of the official reports on the scientific results 

 of the Challenger Expedition. He has also been intrusted with 

 the examination and description of the Isopcda collected by the 

 Expedition, and has the reputation of being a most promising 

 and enthusiastic naturalist. 



Among other legacies in the will of the late Sir William 

 Siemens are 1000/. each to the Scientific Relief Fund of the 

 Royal Society and the Benevolent Fund of the Institution of 

 Civil Engineers. 



The Cunningham Medal of the Royal Irish Society was pre- 

 sented on the 15th inst. to Mr. John Birmingham of Tuam, for 

 his "Contributions to the Advancement of Knowledge in 

 Astronomy." 



Mr. Archii!ALD Geikie, F.R.S., Director-General of the 

 Geological Survey of the United Kingdom, will give the first of 

 a course of five lectures on the Origin of the Scenery of the 

 British Isles, on Tuesday next (January 29), at the Royal Insti- 

 tution of Great Britain. 



In January, 18S3, one of the officers of the Geological Survey 

 of Ireland, Mr. E. T. Hardman, was selected to proceed to 

 Western Australia for the purpose of taking part in an explora- 

 tion of the Kimberley district of that colony. He took the field 

 ill April last, and continued on active service in the bush until 

 near the end of September, having in this interval travelled at 

 least 1500 miles, and having obtained materials for a first geo- 

 logical sketch-map of about 12,800 square miles of country. He 

 has determined the sequence of formations which begin with 

 certain quartzites, schists, and other metamorphic rocks, which 

 he classes provisionally as altered Lower Silurian, but which 

 may be of Archsean age. These are succeeded by limestones 

 and sandstones with gypsum, &c., which are referred to Upper 

 Carboniferous horizons. Certain basalts and felstones occur, the 

 age of which is uncertain. The youngest deposits are Pliocene 

 sands, gravels, conglomerates, and marly limestones ("pindar" 

 of the natives) overlaid by river gravels, extensive plains of 

 alluvium, and, along the sea-coast, by raised beaches. 



Mr. Barnum's so-called white elephant arrived safely last 

 week at the Zoological Gardens from Burinah, and has already 

 attracted many visitors. Prof. Flower, writing to the Times, 

 says : — " The Burmese elephant now deposited in the Zoological 



